These days, I’ve been doing a fair amount of work directly with the designers at work. I’m also sitting directly next to them (marketing and design together – whoddathunkit?) so I’m getting a lot more honesty as to what guidelines they need/want when starting on a project.

This morning, seeing Seth Godin’s post on “How to live happily with a great designer” made me smile. I may have been guilty of the lack of clarity, and a few moments of “I’ll know when I see it”, but I’ve learned to be clear in my brief, and then to let them out to play for a while. Usually gives good results!

If you also work with designers, or even software developers, and are in charge of strategy, briefs, or giving some sort of guidelines before they start work, have a read through. You’ll probably go through the typical steps of “This is funny”, followed by a touch of guilt, finishing with a feeling that this may help you a lot in the long run.

And why don’t you go over and thank you designers for all their hard work today?

PS – The marketer did not get paid off by the designers for writing this article. It’s genuine designer-love. Really!